


Drawn

by murderofonerose (atmilliways)



Series: Strike A Chord [1]
Category: Metalocalypse (Cartoon)
Genre: Boss/Employee Relationship, Bringing a tongue to a sword fight, Charles can be a bastard when he wants to be, M/M, Pity Handjob, Questionable employer/employee relationship, Scarring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:00:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28352841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atmilliways/pseuds/murderofonerose
Summary: Consider that there are security cameras all over Mordhaus and that the only person who has clearance to access all of them is the CFO of Dethklok Inc. Imagine that, over the years, he has grown quite adept at editing footage himself as needed to keep his secrets private.Now, consider certain leaked footage of the demise of Mr. Fjordslorn, one time second manager to the internationally renowned metal band Dethklok.
Relationships: Melmord Fjordslorn/Charles Foster Offdensen
Series: Strike A Chord [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2076360
Comments: 3
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This originally appeared in my other fic Lost In Japan (chapter 6). I'm putting it here as well because this is my only hc for how this pairing might get started.

_Consider that there are security cameras all over Mordhaus and that the only person who has clearance to access all of them is the CFO of Dethklok Inc. Imagine that, over the years, he has grown quite adept at editing footage himself as needed to keep his secrets private._

_Now, consider certain leaked footage of the demise of Mr. Fjordslorn, one time second manager to the internationally renowned metal band Dethklok._

_Towards the end, Offdensen is caught at a dead end on the nose of Mordhaus’ distinctive dragon-shaped figurehead. He drops to avoid the thrust of Fjordslorn’s sword, appearing to then stab him and let his opponent’s momentum carry him into a very long, very fatal fall, followed by being extremely smashed into by the Mordland bullet train._

_The clip that has been expertly, mostly lifted out of this footage goes as follows._

* * *

Melmord landed on his knees and one hand, blade pressed to Charles’ throat and a wild glint in his eye, but he didn’t press forward due to the cold steel against his own throat. “. . . Looks like we have a draw.”

“It seems so,” Charles replied coldly. 

“That shit wasn’t just regular fencing. What kind of suit knows how to sword fight like that?”

“I could ask you the same question.”

“Me? A suit?” Melmord laughed. “Fuck that, it’s just the costume. Just another part of the bullshit—or didn’t you know that?”

“I’m fully aware you are complete bullshit, yes.” 

They stared at each other in an awkward tableau of neither man wanting to concede. Then Melmord glanced between them and smirked. 

“Well shit,” he drawled. “Who would’ve fucking guessed?”

Charles’ eyes narrowed. “What.”

“You enjoy violence, don’tcha? Gets the blood pumping in all the right places, doesn’t it?” 

“That has nothing to do with it.”

“Oh, it doesn’t?” Still smirking, Melmord moved a knee between Charles’ legs and leaned into it, ignoring the edge just a hair's breadth away from cutting into him. “Guess it’s me then. Must be exciting to finally run into somebody who actually gets all the shit you do, huh? Because those five fucking idiots you like ‘working with’ sure don’t.”

The pressure increased just a little, causing a split in the skin roughly as deep as a papercut in warning. “Don’t,” Charles warned. 

“What, don’t like me talking shit about your _boys_?” Melmord didn’t even seem to mind the light cut, just pleased to be getting under the other man’s skin. “Maybe you just like how fucking bad I am. I don’t give a shit and you know it, and it burns you because you’re not in a position where you can afford to have that kind of attitude. If you stop giving a shit, it all falls apart, doesn’t it?”

Charles’ mouth compressed into a thin line, an ever so faint tell that a point might have just been scored. “If that’s true, consider how little sleep I’ll have time to lose over ending you.”

“Or maybe,” Melmord continued in a low, rough voice, “bad is just your type. It’d make sense, considering the company you keep. All those big, buff, won’t-take-no-shit employees who are so loyal they don’t mind dying and clogging those drains down in the basement as long as they’re of service. Hell, even the band would fit the bill—they don’t give a shit about anything, nothing’s badder than that. How tightly wound do you have to be to hold it together around all that shit without anyone noticing you get off on it?”

Without waiting for an answer to the rhetorical question, Melmord grabbed Charles’ sword hand and forced it down; Charles allowed this only because the would-be usurper also pulled back his own sword and dropped it to one side. 

“Wanna unwind?” Melmord asked, his suddenly free hand landing on Charles’ thigh. 

Charles narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

The fingers flexed, massaging teasingly. “Oh come on, what makes you think I actually want to get stuck running this shitshow? I was just planning on running it into the ground while robbing those dumbasses blind, but I’ve got a better idea. A more long term vision that I think we’d both benefit from.” Melmord smirked, and as sleezy as the expression looked on him, Charles was listening. “How about I bring some tongue to this knife fight, and afterwards you keep me on retainer for a generous salary. I’ll get gone and stay as gone as you want me to.”

Oh, that was a bad idea. Charles knew it was a bad idea. 

But unfortunately, the bastard had been right. He did enjoy violence, and his work being understood and therefore properly appreciated. He _was_ very tightly wound, and the hand moving gradually closer to the tent in his suit pants was just cranking the spring even harder. It wouldn’t be long before he snapped. 

“. . . You’ll be willing to sign a contract?”

“Deal,” Melmord said, and went for the belt. 

Soon after, Charles had his hand fisted in the other man’s hair and was holding him tightly in place—being able to breathe was for senior management. He took it beautifully, and Charles was determined that he would take every goddamn bit of it. 

It only took a few minutes. ( _Very_ tightly wound, and not enough free time to do anything about it in.) And then, after a moment of catching his breath, Charles pulled Melmord off him and stabbed him through the shoulder with the sword he had never let go of. 

“I’ll address the paperwork to the nearest hospital,” he said shortly, and greatly enjoyed the look of rosy-lipped shock on Melmords face before pitching him off the roof and off the blade. Then he tucked himself back in his pants with a shiver, the last aftershocks of pleasure still thrumming through him. 

He stood and looked down over the edge just in time to see the battered body below get bashed off the tracks and onto the lawn. His breathing was still uneven from all the exertion, and he thought almost giddily about the massive medical bills that would come directly out of the idiot’s comfortable salary for years to come. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Know thy fucking self.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before reading this, I highly recommend reading TheBraillebarian's [Purgatory](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27696956) if you haven't already, because it's absolutely stunning.

At the first opportunity after he’d been weaned off the pain medication and was no longer under quite so much surveillance, Melmord tracked down some booze and got drunk. He hadn’t found much, but after an interminable stay in the hospital, living on IVs and hospital food, it didn’t take much either and hit him a lot harder and a lot faster than he’d expected. 

How Charles knew to find him in the communal employee kitchen—one of hundreds, probably, but the closest to his new, starkly furnished room—he would never know. By that point he was already swaying in his chair and didn’t think to ask. 

“Having a, ah, little nightcap there, hm?” the man said as he took a seat directly across the table. 

“Fuck you,” Melmord muttered into his bottle. 

Charles shrugged, blank expression unchanging. “Suit yourself. But if you end up putting yourself back in urgent care with alcohol poisoning, any time off is coming directly out of your salary.”

“You don’ give a shit.” 

“Not really, no. But you’re an investment of Dethklok Inc. now, and it’s my job to protect the band’s assets.” 

Melmord took another drink, trying to forget all the stupid choices he’d made to end up here . . . up to and including everything that had happened on that rooftop. Signing that contract didn’t even make the list; by the time it came to that, his course had already been irrevocably locked in. He hadn’t bothered to read the fine print. Hell, fuck reading—on the first attempt he’d signed the bit of bare hospital tray next to it. But it was a contract drawn up by Charles Offdensen, the man who had stabbed him and thrown him off a roof mid-blowjob, and that didn’t bode well. 

He found that he didn’t much care. The booze was definitely helping with that, so he downed another mouthful. As numb as he was becoming, it still burned pleasantly on the way down. 

“Why’re you here?” he mumbled, and heard that his voice was rougher than usual from the drink and whatever emotions his body was going through that he was blissfully too drunk to feel. The disconnect reminded him of being in the hospital. 

Instead of answering, Charles just shrugged. Melmord stared at his blank face and wondered if he even fucking knew. If anyone fucking knew anything. Of course they didn’t—life was one big hustle and the universe was in charge of the game, which was always fixed. 

“Why’re you here,” Melmord mumbled again, more to himself this time. The next swig from his bottle missed his mouth and slopped down his chin, leaving him staring stupidly down and wondering how his shirt had gotten so wet. He pawed at it, then rose swaying to his feet. “I gotta . . . go laundry. Go _do_ laundry. Only have the one shirt.”

Charles raised an eyebrow. “You’ve been issued a week’s worth of work shirts, Fjordslorn.”

“They ain’t _mine_ ,” Melmord spat back. His hands latched onto the back of the chair he’d just vacated—probably that chair. He didn’t know anymore. He wasn’t sure where his room was anymore or how to get back to it. All the hallways looked the same; all of Mordhaus was a fucking murder labyrinth, the innards of a beast that had swallowed him whole and now had only to sit back and digest. 

He let go of the chair and took a first wobbly step, only to stumble and fall forward into a very solid chest. Blinking, trying to focus, a suit and bright red tie swam into his field of vision. 

“It’s this way,” Charles said in his usual, flat, carefully removed voice. Not trying to blunt the edges of anything. (Good, Melmord thought. Maybe by falling on those edges he could kill himself for good this time, and not have to come back to _all this_.) The man seemed to have a knack for guiding drunkards though, because they were in his room with minimal delays or arguments in no time. 

Melmord started haphazardly undoing his shirt buttons as soon as they stepped inside, not wanting to spend another second than necessary in his wet, wasted-smelling only real shirt. Charles continued holding him upright while he did so, without comment. 

But halfway through unbuttoning, a thought hit Melmord like a bolt of lightning. He paused and asked, “You wanna fuck me?”

“Not particularly,” Charles replied dryly. 

“Why not? Y’already fucked me over, why not get your rocks off too. Inn’t that my job now?” Melmord gave up on the shirt buttons and started pawing to get his own pants open. 

When he succeeded, all he got was another raised eyebrow. “You’re freeballing?”

“What can I say, I live as I died,” Melmord declared, shoving his pants down towards his ankles. It was difficult; they kept wanting to bunch up around his knees, and pulling the top of the pants down over the bunched up material wasn’t helping. He tried to stand on one foot and tug everything off, but all it did was unbalance and pitch him against Offdensen’s chest again. 

“You’ve still got your shoes on,” Charles observed with a sigh. “Just get on the bed.”

Next thing he knew, Melmord was on his back staring up at the ceiling while his mortal enemy and boss got his shoes and pants off for him. _Right_ , he thought, _I did offer. Might as well get ready_. He palmed himself clumsily, trying to see if his cock was too drunk to wake up. 

“Stop that,” Charles told him firmly. “I’m not going to fuck you.”

“Why fuck not?” Melmord rasped, incredulous. “That’s the job, isn’t it? That’s. What I said I’d do. Isn’t that in my contract?”

Charles rolled his eyes and started working on undoing the final few buttons of Melmord’s shirt. “I’m not in the habit of fucking people who are about thirty seconds away from being unconscious.”

“How long did it take me to fall off the roof?” Melmord shot back. He heard the whine in his voice—fuck it, he didn’t care. Of all the things he wanted right now, Charles fucking Offdensen definitely wasn’t one of them, but everything had felt wrong ever since he’d woken up at the hospital and wasn’t allowed booze, weed, or to look under his bandages (which he’d done anyway and ended up screaming until they’d sedated him), and the room was spinning like a broken compass, and he needed _something_ to get the needle to settle. Even if ‘something’ ended up being a smack across the face. 

From the tightening of Charles’ mouth and the deep lines around it, that was probably a definite possibility. And then—

Charles’ hand closed around his mostly limp cock, the other pushing the now opened shirt aside as his eyes fixed on the network of scar tissue that was Melmord’s upper body. “You have five minutes.”

Melmord grunted and closed his eyes, not wanting to look at himself. Not yet. Too new. “Gimme an even seven, man, I’m not a fucking teenager.”

“If it’s an even number you want, then six,” Charles retorted with a warning squeeze, making him groan. “And you don’t finish before then, do it on your own time.”

It was the most clinically expert hand job Melmord had ever experienced, and he already knew that he was way too fucked up to get even a weak orgasm out of this. Charles was completely in control of the situation the entire time regardless of who was getting jacked off. Melmord felt like a kite on a string, and Charles was flying him . . . except not quite. 

No, he decided hazily, it felt like he was a puppet and Charles his master, and there wasn’t one string but many. Charles pulled at them all, even the ones that made his lungs draw in and expel air, even the ones that made his muscles twitch and flex around the metal ‘bones’ in his right shoulder and ribcage and parts of his spine. The very fact that he was alive and the very fact that he shouldn’t be were both in the puppet master’s grasp.

He kept his eyes squeezed closed, but he could feel the scars. Felt Charles’ free hand running over them, tracing, exploring the topography like a dedicated map maker. Felt drunken tears dribbling out from between his own eyelids and down the sides of his face because fuck, _fuck_ , he’d screwed up so badly and now this was going to be the rest of his life: just another cog in the machine, with the occasional pity hand job thrown his way the same as one might toss scraps to a dog. That Charles was showing him some amount of charity here was irrelevant; it was a calculated mercy. 

Even through all that, Melmord arched his back and laughed. Despite the fact that Charles had undoubtedly won, they were still sparring. Back and forth, push pull, verbal blow for verbal blow, and now this—it was _funny._

It was like Charles didn’t know how to stop fighting, and Melmord, to his credit, at least knew the same about himself. They would continue scrapping like this forever, and _that_ —even as his consciousness did indeed begin to fade into a deep, dark blackout—almost gave continuing to live some sort of meaning.


End file.
